Galleries West

Western Canada’s art magazine since 2002 19 August 2025  Vol 10 No 17  ISSN 2561-3316  © 2025 From the Editor If you haven't already seen the news, this issue marks the final Galleries West newsletter. You can read more here, in publisher Tom Tait's essay on creating and operating a visual arts magazine in Canada. When I started working with the magazine in October 2023, I knew the time would be limited. The magazine industry is struggling everywhere, especially in Canada.

The Alberta Foundation for the Arts is opening a new gallery, AFA's art house, in the Edison gallery space in downtown Calgary. The new gallery, which will hold a grand opening on Sept. 10, 2025, will be dedicated to showing work from Alberta artists and from the AFA Art Collection. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith will be in attendance, as will the AFA Chair Cynthia Moore.

The ego of the writer flies upwards. It halts midair and hovers, then screeches and brays a wild tune. What a view! But then it plummets to earth, beak an arrowhead, wings pasted to body by the force of rushing air. They won’t open! The paralyzed ego watches the sidewalk get closer and closer. Splat. These ups and downs happen frequently, in a vertiginous rhythm. The highs are wonderful but short-lived.

My first assignment from Galleries West 11 years ago thrust me into warfare. I had covered gun-blazing battles for other publications but this mission was different. It was to write about the state of contemporary war art in Canada. It was the summer of 2014, when Galleries West was still a print magazine. For that story, I interviewed some extraordinary artists and curators who became regular contacts for the next decade of arts journalism.

Dear Gentle Reader, I guess it's true that all good things must come to an end. After 15 years as a print magazine and nine years exclusively online, Galleries West is ceasing publication. Age and health issues make it impossible for me to carry on. And the magazine's precarious financial status makes it less interesting for someone else to take over. The site will remain active for the next few months, but there will be no new content added after Aug. 19, 2025.

Painter Alex Cameron died in Toronto on June 17, 2025. He was 78. He is survived by his family, including his wife, Lorna Hawrysh. “Celebrated for his vibrant landscapes and abstracts, Alex Cameron is one of Canada's most distinguished contemporary painters,” according to a statement from Bau-Xi Gallery.

The new Marianne and Edward Gibson Art Museum (The Gibson) at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, will open Sept. 20, 2025. The new space will be the university’s first purpose-built gallery and will consolidate what has previously been known as SFU Galleries. It will also house the SFU Art Collection of more than 5,800 works connected to the region. The new gallery's first show will be a group exhibition, Edge Effects.

A 13th-century text on cosmography by al-Qazvini glows beside a 16th-century Chinese porcelain dish with Arabic calligraphy and an 18th-century Kashmiri mirror with glass from 17th-century Italy. Among these objects from across Asia and the Mediterranean, Kour Pour’s large-format Cosmic Diagrams radiate in mystical blues.

Edward Fu-Chen Juan explores the impact of Taiwan's government and the subsequent Truth and Reconciliation Commission on the country's diaspora in his new exhibition, Memory Crimes 記憶犯罪. The show is on view until Aug. 30 at Seymour Art Gallery in North Vancouver, British Columbia. “With this body of work, his intention is to pay homage to the victims, their lives, their survival, their descendants, and those who have yet to be acknowledged for their suffering,” according to the gallery statement.

The Hnatyshyn Foundation has announced the 2025 winners of its Mid-Career Awards. Abbas Akhavan is this year's recipient of The Hnatyshyn Foundation Mid-Career Award for Excellence in Visual Arts. He will receive $30,000 to further his career. Born in Iran, Akhavan now splits his time between Montreal and Berlin. He holds a master of fine arts from the University of British Columbia and a bachelor of fine arts from Concordia University. He will represent Canada at the Venice Biennale in 2026.